RE: VW Golf GTI (Mk5) | Shed of the Week

[CDP]

bitofayank said:

Mrs. Bitofayank had a 5 door anniversary special that was a nice car that I had no trouble selling to an enthusiast when we move out of the country. DSG was ok, I did like making it far in partial throttle. Did have the coil packs crap out. Wife still wishes we had that car, so do I

Although it seems to be a common complaint coil packs aren't too expensive or difficult.

With my Audi (a bit newer but nearly double the miles) the bigger issue is the amount of plastic pipes for vacuum, oil breather etc that start to go brittle and leak with age. Several garages before that one was diagnosed and fixed, or more probably before they were all diagnosed and fixed.

[carinaman]

Advert says sold.

CDP said:

spikyone said:

I'd prefer to get public transport than buy a car like this.

- Crappy aftermarket badging
- Tacked on carbon bits
- Heavily tinted rear windows
- Wind deflectors

Pretty much a full house of ugly, tasteless modifications commonly done by oiks and which instantly devalue a car in my eyes. Probably been ragged to within an inch of its life with the bare minimum of maintenance. Kill it with fire.

All those bits can be fixed in afternoon. The windows and badges will just need a hair dryer.

Then find a decent set of secondhand alloys and it will look a lot better.

Unpimp ze Auto:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1MNEqCr748

[DaveyBoyWonder]

One of the few cars I'd have again is a mk5 GTI. Great cars...

[Alx27]

rottenegg said:

Ooh very sheddy indeed. I'm sure the inspiration for the tartan seats came from a skirt Twiggy wore at a fashion show?

The difference between the MK5 and MK4 is chalk and cheese. The MK5's body shell is 125% stiffer. Torsional rigidity improvements between models is NEVER that great. Usually between 15-20% on average. That and the independent rear suspension is why they drive so well, and the same underpinnings are still used on the MK8 to this day.

The only 2 problems with the MK5 are rust and mechanical neglect.

Apart from the well publicised warranty job rotten front wings, the factory e-coat breaks down and leaves plenty of rust spots hidden behind the arch liners and under the plastic sill covers, so the oldest ones are now pretty much restoration projects.

This is where my Edition 30 spent most of it's life. 27mpg average over the 8 years I owned it. It was super reliable though, but only because I looked after it!



The aforementioned hidden rust I had to sort out on mine. So a warning to anyone considering a MK5..... you WILL need to address these areas if you want to keep one going for the foreseeable!

To be fair though, the vanilla Mark 4 Golf and GTI weren't the best cars on the Mk4 platform.

The R32, Audi TT, S3 and Cupra R had reworked front suspension. And the addition of a rear anti-roll bar (which they forked out for on the Mk V as standard) transformed any of the Mk4 cars.

[Alx27]

s m said:

Always imagined they’d have a bit more top end for that power
- my old 16v Astra was similar but was a lot lighter I guess

They still had the KO3S turbo I believe. Spool up fast but run out of puff at higher revs.

[Alx27]

greenarrow said:

Just had a look at my old issue of that road test and the golf had only done 775 miles so probably the engine was very tight. The skoda vRS tested by autocar with the same engine managed 143 mph. The E36 325i managed 141 mph. Also I don't think the golf gti had a very good CD figure. 32 was only average really.....E46 3 series, 29.....affects top speed a fair bit....

Wasn't the suspicion that the vRS Skoda UK supplied had been "tickled"? The specs matched a stage 1 remap I believe.

[Lester H]

Sometimes ‘ Shed of the Week’ comes as a really interesting surprise. Sadly, this one is just a shed. Yes, if it were original, it wouldn’t feature here, it would be £3495 or similar. This ( imho) is one to avoid, and to think how wonderful they were when new, if unaffordable ,to many.

[Mr Tidy]

Alx27 said:

Wasn't the suspicion that the vRS Skoda UK supplied had been "tickled"? The specs matched a stage 1 remap I believe.

I'm sure I remember reading that about the Mk1 Octavia vRS too. The Seat Leon Cupra with the same engine only did 137 IIRC.

[GhiaInjection]

rottenegg said:

njw1 said:

rottenegg said:

The difference between the MK5 and MK4 is chalk and cheese. The MK5's body shell is 125% stiffer. Torsional rigidity improvements between models is NEVER that great. Usually between 15-20% on average. That and the independent rear suspension is why they drive so well, and the same underpinnings are still used on the MK8 to this day.

The late Richard Parry Jones, the very, very talented engineer responsible for how well a mk1 Focus drives was also responsible for most of the underpinnings on the mk5 Golf so it's absolutely no coincidence at all that they drive as well as they do.

Yep, I was going to include words to that effect in my post but figured most folk wouldn't care, but yes indeed, Ford beat VW to it The MK1 Focus also drives very well indeed and if Mr RPJ was responsible for both, which I didn't know, I tip my hat to him

The MK1 Focus and MK5 GTI both introduced a much needed turning point in FWD dynamics. Lets not also forget the EP3 Civic Type R as well for its independent rear suspension. Shame Honda went back to a torsion beam for the FN2. It didn't drive quite as nicely as the EP3, imo.

The E91 and F30 BMW also kinda copied that rear layout, albeit ditching the trailing arms in favour of thrust arms.

There is a bit of re-writing of history going on here. RPJ never worked for VW. He was responsible for the Mk1 Focus and its multi link rear suspension. The Mk1 Focus was launched in 1998 and blew away all the competition in the segment (which included the Mk4 Golf). Due to this, VW decided to headhunt members of the Ford Focus chassis team (One of that team was Karsten Schebsdat - who went on after that to work at Porsche), to work on the Mk5 Golf, which would launch in 2004. This is why the Mk5 Golf rear suspension (and other improvements to the chassis) is a carbon copy of the Mk1 Focus.

See these links to Magazine articles relating to RPJ and Focus suspension influences (BMW 8 Series) I posted on a Ford Focus SOTW thread:

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

I was also surprised that Honda went from double wishbone to Torsion Beam on the Civic (especially when Ford showed how successful good dynamics could be with the Focus). But I assume they were prioritising interior practically over dynamics (Torsion Beam is very space efficient).